Careful
by thorn-bird
Summary: Be careful or you'll hurt yourself...mild slash.


Author: Megs  
Title: Careful  
Pairing: BJ/Hawkeye  
Rating: G for Goofy  
Disclaimer: Don't own them. Don't claim to.  
Summary: Short, pointless, BJ/Hawkeye slash inspired by Guster's "Careful".  
A/N: Not only my first slash fic, my first MASH slash fic. It's terrible, I know. But be kind.

* * *

The world seems at peace. There are people being slaughtered three miles away, but you wouldn't know it. Here, in this small place, in the dark, with the fading moonlight and the sunlight modestly slipping its note beneath the door, there is nothing else but him.

This struggle he always has with himself is sometimes exhausting. He's frightened and disturbed like the rest of us, but something makes him think he's different. He can't let anyone else know how bad it hurts. He only ever does this in the dawn, usually after losing a patient-which isn't often. He runs off to be alone, but he wants me to find him, comfort him, tell him it's all right, even if he doesn't say it.

He sees me, jokes about the terrible coffee, reminisces about what it was like to have cream and sugar and cinnamon.

I sit at the bench beside him, then scoot closer, and, in a move that is supposed to be encouraging, place my hand on his. Even in this peaceful morning, nothing is perfect. He smells faintly of the scented chlorhexidine diacetate, and the Betadine has stained my hands a dull brown.

Burns are, for lack of a better phrase, a big pain in the ass to treat around this place. We need access to a lot of Betadine that we don't have, and completely sterile conditions, which are impossible to achieve in this hellhole, especially when you're completely out of rubber gloves and your supply truck was caught in crossfire. And the fact that said burns were caused by napalm-I've never seen a napalm burn that was first degree-was not helping.

"Napalm's the nastiest thing I've seen yet. Used to get it all the time…sticks to the skin and the clothes and causes severe and violent burns. The temperature is very high and the lasts for a long time," Colonel Potter was muttering, mostly to himself as he treated one of their patients, who was, needless to say, in severe shock. "These boys are lucky to even be alive."

The term 'alive' was used loosely. Out of the whole attack, there had been only four men who could've been saved, one of them died in the ambulance, leaving one patient for each of the doctors (excluding Frank, of course…but who counted him as a doctor anyway?).

The one on Hawkeye's table had been the most critical. It didn't matter that Hawkeye was the best doctor I ever knew. It didn't matter who worked on him…if it had been me, or Potter or anyone…sometimes it was all just a lost cause. There was no hope. But still, he felt incompetent. Scared. Useless. Tired, and-

He is crying now, but trying to hide it. I squeeze his hand. Doesn't he know he can't hide that from me anymore? I know more of his vulnerabilities than anyone else on this compound. Anyone else in this war. Anyone else in this world.

I squeeze his hand again, whisper words that mean nothing. Words that will not heal…I kiss him now, a simple, innocent peck not unlike the awkward spin-the-bottle games when I was a teenager. It means nothing and everything at the same time.

He buries his face in his hands, and all that is heard is the sound of his poorly hidden sobs. I have seen him like this before. Every time it takes him a bit, takes him a moment to let go like this. But every time it comes to this, and I hope that it's good for him, because God knows I worry. And not just for him. Maybe I'm selfish.

Look what the war has done to your husband, Peg. And, Erin…my babydoll…she gets cheated out of a daddy. What's he going to be like when he comes home? Cold, dead inside, maybe…how can I possibly be a nourishing, caring father after…this? Dealing with all this pain and blood and ending up in these quiet moments with my bunkmate…I feel like I'll never be able to look at my daughter again….

The sun is almost fully up now, replacing the cool blueness with an orange glow that is neither warm nor comforting.

I have been here before, here where he is now. More often than Him, actually. He's so much stronger than me…but then, in these moments sometimes I feel like He-

Him. He. He's become so essential that he's a capital letter now. Hawkeye. Him. He. His. Mine. And he thinks he needs me!

He manages a few words, half to me, half to God, I think.

"Didn't…Jesus…text book…Beej…."

I press my forehead against his head and my hand on his shoulder.

"You're all right, Hawk. You're all right."

The words are hanging on the air, and, for the time being at least, he is.

* * *

It's awful, I know. I apologize to Alan Alda, Mike Farrell, the creators of MASH and anyone whose time was wasted, or whose IQ was lowered, because of this.


End file.
